


Fight Like a Girl

by flipflop_diva



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Spoilers, BAMF Maria Hill, BAMF Natasha Romanov, BAMF Women, Gen, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-23
Updated: 2015-06-23
Packaged: 2018-04-05 20:45:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4194309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flipflop_diva/pseuds/flipflop_diva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's lucky for the male Avengers that they have Natasha, Maria and Wanda on their side. Things might not be looking so good for them right now if they didn't. Set post-Age of Ultron, but does include spoilers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fight Like a Girl

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sonotadream](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonotadream/gifts).



_Maria Hill scowled at the sorry group of men in front of her. They all stared sheepishly back at her._

_“We thought … she, uh …” Steve stammered helplessly. Maria glowered at him._

_Clint held his hands up. “ _I_ have been trying to find her.” He joined in the glaring._

_“We’re planning to get Romanoff back,” Steve said meekly, but for once, the captain didn’t sound very confident, almost visibly wilting under Maria’s glare. Which was good. He deserved to feel miserable after they left their teammate alone with an evil killer robot because they were too busy doing who even knows what._

_“No,” Maria said now. “ _I_ am going to go get Nat back. You all get ready to fight. There’s a world that needs saving. Again.”_

_She started to leave, but stopped, instead turning back to stare at them all one by one, making sure they each could feel the weight of her words. “And you all better hope if you ever need _her_ to rescue _you_ that she just doesn’t decide not to. Because I certainly won’t help convince her that she should.”_

_•••_

_“Natasha?” Maria pushed a strand of sweat-soaked hair behind her ear and peered through the bars of the cage. The light was pretty dim, but she could just make out a black-clad figure lying on the ground. “Natasha?” she called again, not wanting to be too loud in case someone else was listening._

_It took a few seconds, but then Maria saw Natasha stir. She pushed herself upright, blinking slowly. “Maria?” she murmured. She looked tired, and a little beaten up, but she seemed otherwise unharmed._

_“You want to get out of there?” Maria said. “There’s an army of robots that need some sense knocked into them, and I thought you might want to be part of that.”_

_Natasha smiled. “You don’t happen to have a key, do you?” She gestured at the lock on the cage._

_Maria grinned, hefted up the machine gun by her side. “I don’t need a key. Now stand back. Then let’s go show these boys how girls fight.”_

[Six months later]

Maria knew something was wrong — really wrong — even before Natasha came flying down the hall, Wanda at her heels. Everything in the base was too dark, too quiet, too _still_. The skin at the back of her neck had started crawling even before she was fully awake, and it had only gotten worse as she’d thrown on some clothes and exited her room into the hall.

Less than ten seconds after that, she had seen Natasha and Wanda.

Maria could probably count on one hand the number of times she had seen Natasha look anything resembling scared, and even though her expression at this moment was as neutral and composed as it normally was, Maria could see the fear in her eyes. Not to mention that Maria knew her well enough to see that her breathing was slightly elevated and that her hands were trembling slightly — all signs she was afraid. And desperate.

Wanda, on the other hand, looked more bewildered than anything, except her hands were jerking by her side, small rays of red light bursting out all around her.

Maria took a deep breath and forced herself to remain calm. Natasha may have been second in command of the Avengers, but Maria was in charge of the base.

“Wanda,” Maria said calmly. She pointed to the girl’s hands. “Take a breath. Let’s not accidentally make this worse.”

Wanda looked down, almost startled by Maria’s words. But almost instantly the red lights disappeared and her face became calmer.

Natasha still looked on the verge of desperation. At least as much as Natasha ever looked desperate, which meant she was blinking more than normal and she looked ready to pounce. At what, Maria didn’t know.

“Nat?”

“They’re gone,” Natasha said.

Maria quirked a brow. Natasha clarified. “All of them,” she said. “All the others. Steve, Sam, Vision, Rhodey. They’re _gone_. It’s like they vanished.”

“We called Clint,” Wanda said.

“Laura said he’s not there!” Natasha’s words were coming out slightly faster than normal. “And Pepper said Tony …”

Maria reached out to put a hand on Natasha’s bare arm — she and Wanda were still dressed in night clothes, not yet having changed into their uniforms — and hoped the warmth of her touch would soak in. She knew how much Natasha cared for the others — how much she needed them — but right now Maria needed the woman who was cool, collected and focused in all situations.

“It’s okay,” Maria said softly. “Whoever took them made a horrible mistake. They left us. We’ll find them. You can find anyone. I know you can.”

Natasha frowned at her for a second, but then she nodded. Beside her, Wanda bopped her head encouragingly.

“Okay, then,” Maria said. “Let’s go figure out what is going on.”

She turned to lead the way down the hall to the base’s command center. As they walked, Maria glanced at Natasha, then elbowed her gently in the side, getting Natasha to turn her head to look at her.

“These boys are lucky they have you, you know,” Maria said. “You’ll get them back.” 

It wasn’t just words. Maria knew Natasha would do anything to find her teammates, and Wanda was a lot stronger than she looked, especially now that she was learning to control her powers. Maria had no worries about the outcome of this unexpected mission.

Natasha didn’t seem quite as convinced. She looked more thoughtful than anything, but then her lip curved up slightly. “Yeah,” she finally said, her voice soft, and Maria was pleased when a few seconds later she smiled for real. “They really are.”


End file.
